


project: assimilation

by kivancalcite



Category: The Thing (1982)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Blood and Violence, Body Horror, Brutal Murder, Canon Universe, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Death, Concussions, Corpses, Delirium, Fate Worse Than Death, Heavy Angst, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Paralysis, Slime, Strangulation, Tentacles, and then gets thrown against a wall, fun stuff!! :), he's basically a blender, it isn't at all pretty, it's like that stuff you hear with certain animals and plants, mac gets assimilated, mac gets splattered with his bf's blood after watching him get violently impaled, they secrete a substance that paralyses the body but leaves them conscious
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-18
Updated: 2021-01-18
Packaged: 2021-03-16 01:41:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28823118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kivancalcite/pseuds/kivancalcite
Summary: Fighting the alien thing has obviously come with casualties, and Mac has been determined enough to not be a part of it and survive intact as a human being. Unfortunately, any hope on the horizon seems doomed as per usual, and understanding the full scope of the alien's assimilation plot looks like it will come far too late for Mac to do anything about it.
Relationships: R. J. MacReady/Windows
Kudos: 1





	1. my blood on your hands

**Author's Note:**

> I've tended to write the Thing as a little more of a malevolent alien, especially for the purposes of a general AU I have for the series, because it's not made clear if it's just assimilating on survival instinct and I thought I could explore this idea further.

It happened almost in slow motion. Mac had tried to fight the Thing that was now in the room with them, and he was running on instinct. He always did. It had its own problems though, even if he could think on his feet. But here he just didn’t have enough time.

It was a split second reaction as the thing flung him violently against a wall and he hit his head, falling to the floor as double vision took over. He tried to scrabble around and push himself back up, but he felt something heavy on his chest shove him back down.

Being thrown into the wall and pushed back down must have taken the wind out of him, because now he couldn’t breathe properly and no weapon was within reach. He wondered just how much of a head wound he’d managed to receive in the process; he tried to swallow back the nausea accumulating in his throat at the idea.

There was a sudden blur of motion as the thing got knocked sideways and repeatedly hit with what appeared to be a blunt object. There was only so many weapons they had to hand after destroying some considerably valuable ones. Working on instinct seemed to be a trend now, especially with how much their survival had been threatened.

Mac could barely comprehend what was happening until he saw a familiar face close to his. He could almost smile if he didn’t realise the kind of situation they were in. He felt himself get gently pulled up into more of a sitting position, and he blinked back his dazed vision, hissing at the pain at the back of his head.

“Windows?” he asked, softly.

“I’m here,” Windows replied back, almost about to smile himself, “are you alright?”

“Yeah,” Mac said, “just a bit of damage. That son of a—”

The moments before it happened, the moments as it happened, really were an eternity. Their conversation has only been moments, and what happened now had now been ripped as quick away as it had started.

A swift barbed tendril had flown out, violently impaling Windows’ chest inches from himself. Neither knew how to react that the thing had taken this moment to take opportunity and wreak vengeance on the person that had interrupted it, and this motion allowed it in the pleasure of spraying Mac with the man’s blood in the process.

The sudden wide eyed expressions froze in this moment as they stared horrified at each other before looking down at the bloody tendril in his chest and back up to meet their eyes. Mac broke even more at the terrified quietness of Windows’ voice.

“Mac?”


	2. pretence is a bitter medicine

He didn’t know how to react, hearing the last thing be his name before the poor guy was dragged backwards and flung back against the wall with a choked cry before the thing that did that rose up in front of him, an abomination of one of his own crew as the bloody tendril snapped back against its shoulder where an arm used to be.

He was still half dazed from being shoved against the wall, and what appeared to be the shovel that Windows had dropped was a few feet nearby. The thing appeared to see his idea and his foot shuffled around trying to drag it closer, but it kicked it back and he half cursed, half panicked as the thing was now in between him and one of the few weapons around.

He made another attempt to scrabble onto his feet but was shoved back down onto his front with a yell of pain, eyes falling over the practically motionless body of Windows, his shirt bloodied from a hole ripped through his chest, and he had to pull himself together and up from the floor and brutalise this thing—

He had tried to push himself up, run on instinct, anything, when he felt a tendril constrict itself around his throat. No, no, no, fuck no, he needed to defend himself and now he couldn’t _breathe_ —

—he didn’t realise just how strong the thing would be as even he was dragged upwards, flailing and kicking and gasping for air as he tried to pull at the slimy coil around his throat.

He’d nonetheless tried to look into its eyes and spat venom. “Son of a bitch,” he finally managed to maliciously spit out as it loosened its grip momentarily to see what he had to say, before twisting the tendril back round and Mac inhaled sharply, eyes growing wide as he felt unable to breathe and the edges of his vision blur.

It was enough that he was looking into the eyes of someone who vaguely resembled one of his crew, one of his friends, when he said this. It was jarring, but that thing nonetheless wasn’t one of them. He couldn’t think about what it used to be. He’d spent most of his life pretending so he wouldn’t go mad.

Or what was left of it, anyway, even if he could be a tough bastard and refused to just give up and die. Although this revolved around not wanting to be assimilated like his friends beforehand and be something else completely.

Then he’d rather die. He’d hoped there’d be a slim chance that the thing would leave it at that, but that could only be stupid wishful thinking. The thing wasn’t here to kill, he knew it. He’d just be another one like the rest of them. But he wanted to pretend. 

Just so he didn’t go completely _mad_ at the thought otherwise.


	3. fighting a losing battle

Mac wondered why the thing would impale Windows like that, if its main instinct was to survive, like any other living thing. He didn’t think this alien had any possibility of discriminating when it came to doing that, but it seemed very interested in him.

He was pretty much on the verge of passing out, his body going limp, when he felt the sensation of the tendril unravelling around his throat and he dropped to the floor in a tangle of limbs like some twisted human puppet, collapsed weakly and choking, coughing painfully as he took the sharpest inhale of air. He barely had the strength to get up, eyes blurry and unfocused as he dazedly stared at the shoes of the thing in front of him.

He didn’t expect it to just drop him like this. To be honest, he couldn’t think properly and his lungs felt like they were on fire, using the last of his strength to force himself onto his back. He thought he’d be dead or assimilated by now, but there he was, a mess lying at the feet of this alien thing—

Wait, he managed to think, lying on the cold floor and breathing heavily, why was he still alive? Still human?

He couldn’t process that for long, feeling the slick wet red tendrils snapping around his wrists and legs and throwing him against the wall and forcefully wrapping them around him, watching the obscured body of Windows lying bleeding opposite him. He couldn’t not be human, he couldn’t do this, not in front of his dead body, he couldn’t give up the fight—

—Mac felt a terrible and painful sensation creep through his bloodstream as the tendrils curled tighter and he couldn’t move, couldn’t fight but only see and yet it couldn’t even be compared to the agony of feeling them burst sharply and swiftly into his skin, through his fingers, hands and legs. He would’ve screamed and lashed out but the paralysis of his body wouldn’t let him, even as his insides felt on fire, cells being annihilated and eaten alive and replaced. He felt like he was bleeding but not as the tendrils curled up and around his insides and felt himself want to explode, eyes bulging out as they broke into his brain, his head now like a blender.

He had no time to think about any of the last things he fought to think about as the whole of his insides were dissolved and replaced whilst it kept him conscious, even as the bleeding corpse of Windows lay collapsed in a heap of limbs at the opposite end of the room. He passed out eventually for what felt like an eternity but were mere seconds, but instead of being horrified, he merely sharply inhaled and blinked rapidly, before finding himself get up to find the flamethrower, so he could dispose of the remains of what was once his boyfriend.


End file.
